black friday

A Zombie-apocalypse is not something that keeps most support teams paranoid about. After all, it isn’t something that happens every day.
But that is exactly what’s so scary about it?
Zombie attacks can stem out of pretty much anything, right from a barrel of toxic gas that was accidentally opened, to a Black Friday sale with deep discounts on the latest gadget.
And you can be pretty sure that the attack is going to start quick and grow big with very little warning. Unless your support team is ready when it strikes, you might wake up the next morning to find a burnt-up help desk, and a lot fewer customers.
So how can you can you get your customer support to be ready for the zombie apocalypse?
This guide will walk you through everything you can and should do to make your support team proactive before the zombies rise, effective during the attack, and heroes after.

See the 2017 retail holiday recap for learnings you can use while planning for Holiday 2018.
Why the target audience should care: Get the trends from last year’s holiday season so you can predict your results this year. Find out why Black Friday online sales are expected to surpass Cyber Monday’s, why bigger retailers are stealing online share from smaller retailers, and why search advertising and mobile optimization should be your top priorities this season.

KEY FINDINGS
1. Online holiday shopping season in 2017 tops expectations. Online shopping totaled $108.2B during the 2017 holiday season, representing 14.7% growth year-over year ($107.4B, 13.8% growth predicted)
2. The Thanksgiving weekend was one for the record books. Holiday shoppers took full advantage of deep discounts and spent over $19B dollars during the five days between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday
3. Cyber Monday and Black Friday stay dominant and emerge as mobile mega-days. Cyber Monday was the first day with over $2.0B in mobile shopping alone
4. Big retailers won big, but small retailers competed on key days. The largest retailers saw big holiday season growth while smaller retailers had an advantage during the Thanksgiving weekend, particularly on mobile devices
5. Big markets drive holiday growth. The nation’s largest markets saw big growth, particularly on key days

During the busy holiday season, it takes exceptional marketing to
stand out from the crowd. Make a statement with social integrations that place your customer at the heart of your campaign. It’s a timeless look. During the 2013 holiday season, luxury watch retailer Tourneau increased watch sales 57% by helping fans find the perfect gift with their omni-channel #TourneauKnows campaign. Just as in fashion, your brand
should seek campaign inspiration further afield. Take a cue from tech sector giant, Cisco, who breathed new life into the banner ad by creating socially powered ad units. It was an arresting experience that aligned with readers of The Huffington Post, where the ads were displayed.
If you are seeking new, innovative ways to capture your audience’s attention this holiday season—look no further—we’ve curated the top five social experiences for the holidays to inspire your efforts.

The challenge for brands and retailers is clear.
To win during the holiday shopping season, they must:
• Plan holiday campaigns leveraging the very best data
resources you can to inform messaging and targeting
• Use the fragmented holiday shopping journey to their
advantage – meeting shoppers in the moments
that matter
• Cut through the noise on Black Friday – and throughout
holiday – to reach consumers with relevant, authentic
messages that resonate

See the 2017 retail holiday recap for learnings you can use while planning for Holiday 2018.
Get the trends from last year’s holiday season so you can predict your results this year. Find out why Black Friday online sales are expected to surpass Cyber Monday’s, why bigger retailers are stealing online share from smaller retailers, and why search advertising and mobile optimization should be your top priorities this season.

KEY FINDINGS
1. Online holiday shopping season in 2017 tops expectations. Online shopping totaled $108.2B during the 2017 holiday season, representing 14.7% growth year-over year ($107.4B, 13.8% growth predicted)
2. The Thanksgiving weekend was one for the record books. Holiday shoppers took full advantage of deep discounts and spent over $19B dollars during the five days between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday
3. Cyber Monday and Black Friday stay dominant and emerge as mobile mega-days. Cyber Monday was the first day with over $2.0B in mobile shopping alone
4. Big retailers won big, but small retailers competed on key days. The largest retailers saw big holiday season growth while smaller retailers had an advantage during the Thanksgiving weekend, particularly on mobile devices
5. Big markets drive holiday growth. The nation’s largest markets saw big growth, particularly on key days

During the busy holiday season, it takes exceptional marketing to
stand out from the crowd. Make a statement with social integrations that place your customer at the heart of your campaign. It’s a timeless look. During the 2013 holiday season, luxury watch retailer Tourneau increased watch sales 57% by helping fans find the perfect gift with their omni-channel #TourneauKnows campaign. Just as in fashion, your brand should seek campaign inspiration further afield. Take a cue from tech sector giant, Cisco, who breathed new life into the banner ad by creating socially powered ad units. It was an arresting experience that aligned with readers of The Huffington Post, where the ads were displayed.
If you are seeking new, innovative ways to capture your audience’s attention this holiday season—look no further—we’ve curated the top five social experiences for the holidays to inspire your efforts.

This Black Friday, 50% of traffic will be from mobile. Are you ready?
This guide will give you actionable advice on how to capture your share of this year’s holiday spending spree. This guide gives you actionable advice to make the most out of the remaining time before Black Friday 2014 to optimize for higher conversions.

Download this case study to learn how Crimson Hexagon developed a framework for measuring advertising effectiveness by analyzing the online conversations surrounding Target's major Black Friday ad campaigns in 2011 and 2012.

How do shopping holidays like Cyber Monday and Boxing Day affect review usage? What does review traffic reveal about back-to-school shopping? Download The Conversation Index to see how customer conversations impact the global shopping seasons.

For most retailers, the holidays are a frenzied rush of juggling multiple campaigns, meeting revenue goals, and hitting lofty numbers before the year is up. It’s far from a relaxing time of year.
The holiday season has become critically important to online retailers. With the rise of Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday, Green Monday, Super Saturday, and Boxing Day, the definition of “the holidays” has expanded substantially. While these retail days have helped distribute the holiday rush across a wider range, they’ve also made holiday campaign planning far more complex.
Expanding digital channels, such as mobile and social media, have added to the immense opportunities that the holidays provide. Just last year, mobile accounted for 50.3% of all e-commerce traffic, surpassed desktop traffic for the first time ever. Knowing this, it shouldn’t be a surprise that 38% of shoppers now say they will not return to a retailer’s website if it’s not mobile optimized.